ey heard in the hall,
where the workmen and slaves were sleeping, the blast of a trumpet
intended to awake them. Selene started, drew her mantle more closely
round her, begged Pollux to take care of her father, and to hide the
wine-jar which was standing near him from the work-people and then,
forgetting her lamp, she went hastily toward the door by which she
had entered. Pollux hurried after her to light the way and while he
accompanied her as far as the door of her rooms, by his warm and urgent
words which appealed wonderfully to her heart, he extracted from her a
promise to stand once more in her mantle as his model.

A quarter of an hour later the steward was safe in bed and still
sleeping soundly, while Pollux, who had stretched himself on a mattress
behind his screen, could not for a long time cease to think of the pale
girl with her benumbed soul. At last sleep overcame him too, and a sweet
dream showed him pretty little Arsinoe, who but for him must infallibly
have been killed by the Numidian's restive horse, taking away her sister
Selene's almond-cake and giving it to him. The pale girl submitted
quietly to the robbery and only smiled coldly and silently to herself.

CHAPTER VI.

Alexandria was in the greatest excitement.

The Emperor's visit now immediately impending had tempted the busy
hive of citizens away from the common round of life in which, day after
day,--swarming, hurrying, pushing each other on, or running each other
down--they raced for bread and for the means of filling their hours of
leisure with pleasures and amusements. The unceasing wheel of industry
to-day had pause in the factories, workshops, storehouses and courts of
justice, for all sorts and conditions of men were inspired by the same
desire to celebrate Hadrian's visit with unheard-of splendor. All that
the citizens could command of inventive skill, of wealth, and of beauty
was called forth to be displayed in the games and processions which were
to fill up a number of days. The richest of the heathen citizens had
undertaken the management of the pieces to be performed in the Theatre,
of the mock fight on the lake, and of the sanguinary games in the
Amphitheatre; and so great was the number of opulent persons that many
more were prepared to pay for smaller projects, for which there was
no opening. Nevertheless the arrangements for certain portions of the
procession, in which even the less wealthy were to take a share, the
erect